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Overpopulation is too big a problem to ignore

The load we put on the planet is unsustainable, but we can avoid a vast human tragedy

John Sulston

October 10 2011, 1:01am, The Times

Here’s something you might like to try at a dinner party. During the discussion about house prices, raise the subject of population, and ask your fellow diners how relevant they consider that issue to be to Britain. You are likely to be met with blank faces or worse.

It’s an uncomfortable subject for politicians; the idea of influencing family size has unpleasant associations with state coercion. But population does need to be talked about. Rising numbers and the associated consumption of resources is putting an unsustainable load on Earth. That is why the Royal Society, the national academy of science, has begun a comprehensive study, which I am chairing.

Since 1950, the global population has swelled almost threefold. The current population of almost seven billion…